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Chinese Authorities and Retailers Removing iPads from Sale Over Trademark Issues?
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All this over the iPad name WTF? Oh I love when some BS company can pull stuff like this. Oh well that what happens when making things does not mean that much any more and only the brand seem to be the value. Just another day in our Monkey brain world. I don't think you can find a name for anything that someone else is not trolling one way or another for a payoff. 
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Feeling sorry for a Corporation makes no sense. I like Apple products but I can't say I feel sorry for a corporation that sues over the least thing when it comes to their own trademarks. Sorry this time I am on the side of the consumer who will end up paying for it in some way.
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Feeling sorry for a Corporation makes no sense. I like Apple products but I can't say I feel sorry for a corporation that sues over the least thing when it comes to their own trademarks. Sorry this time I am on the side of the consumer who will end up paying for it in some way.
They act like it's only the Chinese government they hate (not the people) but the comments I read never make that distinction and have all the hallmarks of racism that would never be tolerated against other ethnic groups.
Apple routinely sue companies when they infringe on their trademarks. Why shouldn't Proview do the same.
Not only that - Proview has been releasing products under the iPad name since 2001!
The comments on these forums are astounding sometimes; Apple can do no wrong, and China is evil.
How many of you have actually been to China? The average American will be surprised how advanced the cities are in comparison to the average American city. Things are changing to fast, perhaps people don't know to respond but with inane comments.
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Appletriotism (Apple fanboyism mixed with American patriotism).
Applexenolaborphoby (Apple fanboysim mixed with foreign manpower hate).
In this forum, loving Apple frequently appears mixed with loving US.
Let me understand this :
Sounds like business as usual.
- Proview makes IPAD monitors
- Apple purchases the rights to IPAD from the parent company of Proview
- Apple's iPads sell like crazy
- Proview sues Apple for 1.6B claiming parent company had no rights to sell the name.
- Apple sues parent company for 2.0B for misrepresentation of ownership?
- Apple takes 1.6B tax write off
Sounds like business as usual.
The average Apple owner is already complaining about the cost of Apple products... imaging the cost of the products if everything were built in the US.
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While India is growing at a quick rate, China and India are not comparable. India faces political deadlock, lack of infrastructure, education, and a engrained class divide is hindering the country's growth.
Try driving in India; it's road system is way out of date. India's rail system is pretty bad in comparison to Chinas... and the bureaucracy boggles the mind.
India will obviously continue to grow due to the sheer number of people, but there is a reason why western business prefer doing business in China vs India despite all the problems.
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For someone who lives in China, you understand very little about the country. Of course it's a political matter. It's always a political matter with the Chinese. If it were a simple matter of protecting IP, then they'd have to shut down about 90% of their own factories, and most of their military hardware, capital equipment, etc. Since it's pretty much all copied from the West/Japan.
As for anti-Chinese sentiment, they brought it upon themselves. When China stops violating international law, bullying Asian neighbours, butchering Tibetans and Uyghurs, spewing pollution all over the globe, and denying their own people basic rights, then they'll be worthy of respect.
Same can be said for the United States.
I just found it funny when people say one country is holier than thou.
Oh I see what you did there, you exposed my hypocrisy by demonstrating that the US is just as bad as China. That must have taken a lot of effort.
You mean in the spirit of Lenin's Russia or Carl Marx. If they the US cancelled all trade agreements with china? They will have nothing as they have invented nothing.
Sure, in the land where fake Applestore is in business and all kinds of cheap iPad/iPhone knock off exist, it's a laughable at best. Pretty pathetic and hypocritical. Of course, there will be people who envy Apple's success and attack them every chance possible.
According to the New York Times: 'The number of American workers in unions declined sharply last year, (2011), the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported on Friday, with the percentage slipping to 11.9 percent, the lowest rate in more than 70 years.
The report found that the number of workers in unions fell by 612,000 last year to 14.7 million, an even larger decrease than the overall 417,000 decline in the total number of Americans working.
This can't be serious. Why should iPad be considered an indispensable product? I suspect I'll never buy one and maybe I will jump directly to augmented-reality retina implants. No country NEED an iPad to evolve socially and economically. It is just as superfluous as Kopi Luwak coffee.
Let's clear something out:
China's market is way more powerful and needed than Apple or even the US market.
Anybody who's not an ignorant Internet ****, who doesn't know ish about business, knows this.
In fact the recent Apple strategy, which board of investors didn't appoint the uncharismatic ex-director of production Tim Cook as CEO for nothing, is all about exponential growth with the introduction of their product to mainstream market, especially in new industrialized countries such as Brazil or China where the middle-class are expected to be larger than of the whole western countries by 2014.
Apple needs a stable relationship with China but let's not forget that they only introduced their products for the first time in this market with the iPhone 4S and the iPad 2.
China's market is way more powerful and needed than Apple or even the US market.
Anybody who's not an ignorant Internet ****, who doesn't know ish about business, knows this.
In fact the recent Apple strategy, which board of investors didn't appoint the uncharismatic ex-director of production Tim Cook as CEO for nothing, is all about exponential growth with the introduction of their product to mainstream market, especially in new industrialized countries such as Brazil or China where the middle-class are expected to be larger than of the whole western countries by 2014.
Apple needs a stable relationship with China but let's not forget that they only introduced their products for the first time in this market with the iPhone 4S and the iPad 2.
Here's what I think Apple should do.
1. go to Europe and sue the parent company for acting in bad faith by claiming they were selling Global Rights that they didn't fully own.
2. stop selling the iPad in China. I don't mean change the name. I mean stop selling it. No shipments to resellers, nothing in the apple store, nothing in the online store. no buying it from another place and having it shipped into China.
3. Put it on the Chinese government to make sure that no one smuggles in iPads from Hong Kong etc to sell them. After all, it is the government that said that the iPad can't be sold in China so they need to enforce that ruling. Even if necessary to the point of making people declare their personal devices when they are leaving the country so it isn't confiscated when they return. Etc
4. pay the $30-50 million fine. Apple makes that kind of money back in a week or two. it's not really a huge deal.
1. go to Europe and sue the parent company for acting in bad faith by claiming they were selling Global Rights that they didn't fully own.
2. stop selling the iPad in China. I don't mean change the name. I mean stop selling it. No shipments to resellers, nothing in the apple store, nothing in the online store. no buying it from another place and having it shipped into China.
3. Put it on the Chinese government to make sure that no one smuggles in iPads from Hong Kong etc to sell them. After all, it is the government that said that the iPad can't be sold in China so they need to enforce that ruling. Even if necessary to the point of making people declare their personal devices when they are leaving the country so it isn't confiscated when they return. Etc
4. pay the $30-50 million fine. Apple makes that kind of money back in a week or two. it's not really a huge deal.
It is just totally foolish to have all production in China, or any country. With options comes power.
Right now we can practically see money changing hands, which is illegal in the US BTW, even if it occurs overseas. Ol' Rupert is finding this out. Apple just doesn't need to be in this vulnerable position.
Right now we can practically see money changing hands, which is illegal in the US BTW, even if it occurs overseas. Ol' Rupert is finding this out. Apple just doesn't need to be in this vulnerable position.
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_0_1 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1 Mobile/9A406 Safari/7534.48.3)
You are blind. The x5 clone is almost identical. Easily mistake it for a real x5.
All suv are not the same. I have ever confused an ML, x5, range rover. The clone I would have to examine to find any differences.
tbrinkma said:
You are blind. The x5 clone is almost identical. Easily mistake it for a real x5.
All suv are not the same. I have ever confused an ML, x5, range rover. The clone I would have to examine to find any differences.
Since never
Unfortunately, you won't find a government out there that isn't unfair and hypocritical.
Not sure what the big deal is here...
Apple thought they owned the rights, Proview thinks otherwise. That is what courts are for...to clear things up.
I think we can safely say that Apple did not act maliciously - that they honestly thought they had done their due diligence. IF (and that is big IF) they lose the court cases, they will simply pay a fine.... I'm betting it will be reduced by the courts from the $billion figure since it was not malicious infringement... and they will either buy the rights (probably what Proview wants in any case) or Apple will rename the iPad for the Chinese market.
Apple will not "punish" China by pulling any manufacturing or sales out - that market is too important to Apple. imho, of course
However - I bet we will start to see some contingency plans put in place in a few years. No company wants to be in a position where their options are severely limited because that company is dependent on a single supplier. Apple got lucky with their HDDs (Thailand flooding) because so many Macs come with SSDs.
If this court case goes against Apple, and if they feel they are being badly treated.... then they are hooped. They will have to pay whatever the court orders. Realistically, they can't hope to pressure China in any meaningful way. If Apple tries to push the Chinese Government, the government simply needs to bottleneck the supplies coming into the Foxconn factories, or to restrict the products coming out. It is the single point of pressure that Apple is vulnerable to.
Someone at Apple, I'm sure, has been tasked with trying to figure out how to diversify their manufacturing in the future. Perhaps Foxconn's new factories in Brazil are part of this diversification? The story behind the factories is that they are a way to bypass the import tariffs Brazil imposes.... but perhaps the factories are being built big enough to handle some serious export numbers too? Brazil would love that!
Is Foxconn building factories anywhere else? I'm not really following this news.... if so, then I would suggest that Apple - with Foxconn as a partner - has already identified their vulnerability and is moving to address the problem.
Apple thought they owned the rights, Proview thinks otherwise. That is what courts are for...to clear things up.
I think we can safely say that Apple did not act maliciously - that they honestly thought they had done their due diligence. IF (and that is big IF) they lose the court cases, they will simply pay a fine.... I'm betting it will be reduced by the courts from the $billion figure since it was not malicious infringement... and they will either buy the rights (probably what Proview wants in any case) or Apple will rename the iPad for the Chinese market.
Apple will not "punish" China by pulling any manufacturing or sales out - that market is too important to Apple. imho, of course
However - I bet we will start to see some contingency plans put in place in a few years. No company wants to be in a position where their options are severely limited because that company is dependent on a single supplier. Apple got lucky with their HDDs (Thailand flooding) because so many Macs come with SSDs.
If this court case goes against Apple, and if they feel they are being badly treated.... then they are hooped. They will have to pay whatever the court orders. Realistically, they can't hope to pressure China in any meaningful way. If Apple tries to push the Chinese Government, the government simply needs to bottleneck the supplies coming into the Foxconn factories, or to restrict the products coming out. It is the single point of pressure that Apple is vulnerable to.
Someone at Apple, I'm sure, has been tasked with trying to figure out how to diversify their manufacturing in the future. Perhaps Foxconn's new factories in Brazil are part of this diversification? The story behind the factories is that they are a way to bypass the import tariffs Brazil imposes.... but perhaps the factories are being built big enough to handle some serious export numbers too? Brazil would love that!
Is Foxconn building factories anywhere else? I'm not really following this news.... if so, then I would suggest that Apple - with Foxconn as a partner - has already identified their vulnerability and is moving to address the problem.